The Tinsel War
by Garmonbozia
Summary: Xmas Special   Looking forward to Christmas?  Planning on making it a good one?  Well, hell, folks, good for you!  Do me a favour, though; don't mention it in front of River.    Every chapter a present for one of my shiny, spangly, glorious readership!
1. Chapter 1

The day before Christmas Eve, she disappears, and the day after Boxing Day, she returns. Doctor Song's annual sabbatical from Stormcage is as inevitable as that other Great Escape, come Christmas, and so they are waiting for her. No alarms when she returns, no wailing siren, no battalions of guards, like any other return.

Oh, what folly. That far in the future, they are perhaps unaware of the Laws put in place by Messrs Sod and Murphy, those eternal tenets that govern all life; the day you are unprepared is the day you should have barricaded the door.

She returns still armed, and fires pointless and frustrated holes into the walls. The first guard to approach her is tender, delicate. He only wants the gun, that's all. Calm and coaxing, he tells her that whatever happened outside is over now, and that he can't let her compromise security here, and that if she'll just hand it over-

River punches him, and on the blow he crumples to a pile at her feet.

The next is not so kindly. He needs two punches.

By the time she reaches her cell, they have managed to mobilize, a ragtag group of patrolmen from this circle gathered at the bars. Finally, River relents. The gun falls limp on one finger, and she raises up her hands.

"Fine," she sighs. "Naughty River, slapped wrist. You can put me back in my cell now. I may kick the wall a few times. Then I'll fall asleep, and I intend to stay that way for several days."

This said, her intentions clearly stated so that all might assist her in their achievement, she steps forward. Almost without looking. They should have moved, and opened the door for her. They should lock her in and leave her in peace.

But they have not moved.

"Boys?"

They shift and stir amongst themselves. One, the bravest, is nominated to speak. Nominated, of course, in that playground way, where everyone else looks at their feet before he can, and he realizes he's It.

"Orders from the Governor, Doctor Song. Before we can let you-"

"Oh. No. No, don't do this to me."

"I'm sorry, it's straight from Bracewell."

"_Please_…"

"You're going to have to visit-"

"_I'm still armed, you b-"  
><em>The clack-ict noise of all their stunners cocking stops her. She sighs again. Hangs limp, looking, for the briefest of moments, almost defeated. Then suddenly stiffens and hurls her weapon at the one who spoke. It clocks him neatly on the temple and she leaves a third unconscious body in her wake. Then stands, lost and empty-handed and shrugs at the rest of that shy bunch.

"So take me to him."

_Him_ is straightening the new knickknacks on his new desk. Setting the Newton's cradle swinging only to stop it again. The clicks make him nervous. Sound too much like the clock, like his racing heart. And _God_, he wants a cigarette, but quitting was all part of coming here. New job, new surroundings, new lungs. Whole new Phillip Frungle, PhD, psychiatrist to the universe's most notorious prison.

And about to meet its most notorious inmate for the first time.

The nicotine patch isn't working anymore. He should have stayed at Alcatraz II with the suicidal tax dodgers. Alcatraz was so easy.

But no. Phil's strong, he can do this. He's been waiting for the chance like this. This is his step up. He's ready for this, dammit, he's been ready for years and just waiting for the opportunity. And is he going to let nerves get the better of him now, now that he's here? _Hell_ no. Not Phillip Frungle, the new, strong, utterly gagging for a cigarette Phillip Frungle. That guy can _do_ this.

From out in the hallway, outside his door, a crash like God himself is trying to come through the wall.

"_I know who's door it is, thank you very much_!"

It's the strangest thing, but the knees disappear out of Phillip's legs. Shin and thigh are left perfectly intact, but the knee is gone. He sits. Has no choice. No thought in his mind but, _River-Song-that's-River-Song-oh-my-god-that's-_

"Oh! Oh, _hello_…"

A purring. A satiated noise. It is the sound of a cat who has its mouse and now is merely toying with it. She enters in a haze of some strange and fusty smell, heavy with jasmine and ambergris, tousled and exhausted and brimming with murder. Hangs in the doorway with eyes like lasers, locked on him.

"Oh, you're _new_ here," she goes on. "Oh, we haven't _met_. I'm River, and you're…" She leans in, peering over-dramatically at the new brass name-bar on his desk. "_Phillip Frungle_, well, that's… that's certainly… that's a name, no doubt."

"Have a seat, Doctor Song."

She does, heavily, rolling her head to rest on the chair back. "I could go to sleep and you could just pretend we have this conversation."

"What conversation?"

She lays it out for him in perfect detail. The imitation of his voice, he feels, is a little much, but she hasn't hit him with anything yet. According to the stories, that puts him one up on his predecessor. She tells him that he'll ask how she escaped, and she'll tell him that the Doctor came for her. Then he'll ask why, from various angles, and she'll tell him straight on every time where to stick it.

"Difficult Christmas, was it?" he tries instead.

She growls, through her teeth, eyes squeezed shut like the very words give her a headache. "Don't say that."

"Say what?"  
>"The <em>C-<em>word…"

Oh yes! This is the new Phillip Frungle, cutting straight to the heart of the matter, mining the dark core of the problem from minute one. This is what he came here for, what's going to make his name, and oh my God, is she crying?

He's telling himself, strongly, repeatedly, not to smile too broadly.

"Doctor Song?"

"I'm sorry," she mutters. One hand waves him off, the other covering her face. "I'm fine."

Wonderfully, beautifully, he produces a box of tissues from his desk drawer.

This is the moment. She's going to trust him, they're going to get along famously. There's an article in this. A _book,_ even.

He's busy dreaming of fame and fortune, and doesn't notice her staring at the tissues until she throws them at him.

"What the hell!" he balks, not quite keeping his perfect control. More irritated than he should be with an inmate, "So at what point did it turn into a _C-word_ then?"

"What, Christmas?"

"No, _you_. Cow…"

"Oh, you're worse than him! In fact, no, you're not, at least you just come _out_ with it…"

So he drops the pretence of clinical remove. Picks the tissues up from the floor and actually leans across the desk this time, hands them to her. Leans, yes, and leans right in, and asks with genuine interest, "God, what _happened_, River?"

"…I'm going to kill him."

"Haven't you? Isn't that why you're here?"

"Read the case file, Phil Frungle, you're way behind." He falters. And she sees that. Maybe, slightly, softens. Takes pity on him. "The _moment_ after I escaped, Phil. That's when it started to go wrong…"

[I am making a special Christmas present of every chapter for one of you good, good people. This first one is for Meg, who none of you will have heard of, but who has been totally instrumental – my own Miss Frungle. Merry Christmas, doll, and thanks for all the cookies!]


	2. Chapter 2

He doesn't like tinsel, you see, Phil.

Well, no, I'm a liar. He loves tinsel. Big child, really. And were he, some morning, to wake having been wrapped up all in tinsel, he would enjoy that very much, and probably go about swinging his arms and pretending he was a Hillin or a Great Crested Snart of mating age or something like that. Not a Christmas tree, though, that wouldn't cross his mind.

"I take it this is The Doctor we're talking about, yes, River?"

Oh, Phil, who else?

But anyway, to clarify, he hates tinsel _on the Tardis_. And with good cause too; it gets into things and sticks and is made of glass which has on occasion been known to be a non-conductor and break things. She's a delicate machine, for all the abuse she takes. Break one thing and it all goes along.

"What's tinsel got to do with anyth- _Don't throw that_!"

I'm _getting_ to what tinsel has to do with anything; I was just giving you the background and _you_, Doctor Phillip Frungle, would be well-advised not to interrupt again.

What tinsel's got to do with, or what's got to do with tinsel, matter of fact, is what happened the day before Christmas Eve. Now as I'm sure all you Stormcage boys know, my husband came to get me. He parked his craft like any other visitor, made his way down here like same, then soniced the locks and off we went.

Point is, we were in something of a rush, what with the stunners and sirens. It's the best part, is the rush. The heartbeat bit, all hand in hand and no defence but each other. It's a thing of beauty, Phil, you should try it sometime. Point is, he wasn't gone from the Tardis very long. There was no messing about around the cell. Or in the cell. That's been known to happen. Nothing to get the boys up there watching the CCTV all excited.

And don't think I don't see all those cameras turning round anytime that should be happening, gents.

Ten minutes, tops, is about my point here.

And in the space of ten minutes my mum had basically managed to coat the console room in tinsel. And her and Dad, they jump out, with their big well-meaning smiles and shout, "Surprise!"

Which I thought was meant for me, since I wasn't aware they were even going to be there, but I'll get to that. That was a whole other balloon, Phil, and yet to burst.

Tell me, though, Doctor Frungle PhD, what would you have done? Even under the tinsel-hating, potentially-life-threatening circumstances? What would you have done? I'm asking you, Phil, because you seem like a reasonable man, and polite and genuine and that kind of thing. Would you, for instance, have smiled, and been appreciative, and quietly removed tinsel from any sensitive places before taking off? Or would you, perhaps, have had a quiet explanatory word with the young lady who is supposed to be one of your closest friends and done everything nice and civilly?

Or would you, and bear with me on this one because it might not make much sense to a sensible person like you or me, have just asked straight away, and not so much asked as ordered, that it all be taken down right away? And upon that young lady's refusal to do so, would you then have begun to take it down yourself?

"Probably not that last one…"

No, of course you wouldn't have, Phil. You're sane. You're normal and you think about other people and their feelings, Phil. You don't know what a relative rarity you are.

"So what happened, River?"

Well, he's going about like a madman, tearing down tinsel, and Mum, at first, she thinks it's all a big joke. Followed him around, called him a Scrooge, you know the type of thing. Then she started putting it back up behind him. And he wasn't happy about that. So he finally decided to explain to her the whys and wherefores of not hanging tinsel off the time rotor or stuffing it down the transdimensional regulator. 'Finally' being about five minutes too late and in entirely the wrong tone and volume of voice. She got annoyed, started shouting back, how he makes her feel like a child sometimes and he says, because he's an idiot, Phil, a beautiful idiot but an idiot nonetheless and I make no bones about that-

"What'd he say?"  
>He said, 'You are a child'.<p>

Which is fine. He's nine-hundred-and… _something_, not sure when he was coming from. But that's not the way she took it.

Then it turned nasty. There's me standing, having thought this was going to be the start of the Christmas holidays, and Dad didn't know _where_ to put himself, and they were scaring the little one, so-

"Wait, what, hm? Hold on. 'Little one'?"

You can stop flicking through the file, Phil, you haven't missed anything there. There's a girl at that particular point in time. She's on board with him until he knows she's not going to kill him anymore.

"But _you_-"

My God, you're _obsessed_. That's not true, Phil, that's not happening. Anyway, this other girl was a different assassin altogether. Jessica. And she's not really like that. She's a sweetheart, really, but it's all left her a bit wary of conflict.

"Where was she?"  
>Well, first she tried to follow him. Wanted him to calm down, doing her level best. He thought she was there to help, of course, and started handing her the tinsel, which Mum kept taking off her again, which just left her even more stuck. Eventually she sat down under it all. Completely lost. Would have cried if she understood the concept.<p>

Oh, don't look at me like that, Phil. Keep up or just let it go.

Anyway, ultimately Mum stormed out and Dad went to see to her, and he walks up to me, the Doctor this is, and apparently doesn't see that I'm about to kill him and says, "Oh, sorry about that, River, silly humans blah blah not like us blah clinging to antiquated tradition blah-di-blah."

And I'm like, "Those silly humans just happen to be my parents."

He gets all cagy then and holds onto my arm and says, "You're not going to flounce out too, are you?"

Says I, "No, but you're going to go and apologize to Mummy," and he refuses. Which led to… something of an argument.

"Why do I get the feeling you're holding back a touch there?"

Well, there was the tinsel thing and then there was the fact that Mum and Dad were there. He usually gives me a bit of warning if it's going to be a family affair. It isn't always, y'know. Generally we have Christmas on a secluded white sand shore somewhere, or something equally lovely. It's a _holiday_, you know?

Anyhow, suffice to say, Phil, it ended with both of us headed in opposite directions looking for the same first aid box.

"You threw something."

I did. I'm into it lately. Experimenting with long-range combat and finding it pleasing.

Anyway, _he_ was going the wrong way.

So I was passing the morning room. And inside there's this fevered little rustling noise. So I put my head around the door. Jessica, Phil. Little Jessica kicking the living daylights out of a heap of tinsel and telling it off under her breath for being bad and getting Amypond in trouble and making Doctor angry. "Shiny snakes am having been bad," she said to me. Break your heart if you let it…

"Sorry… _what_ age is this girl?"

Nobody's sure. Fifteen, sixteen? Thereabouts… You're _staring_ at me again, Phil, what's the matter?

"'Shiny snakes'?"

Oh, right… Yeah, best just go along with that. Actually, _think_ about that, and then think about how difficult it would be to explain anything to somebody whose concepts are so far up the left. _Especially_ trying to change their mind about anything.

I decided, being the bright and selfless sunbeam of a soul that I am, to save the day. Not to let Christmas get off on the wrong foot. It was gracious of me, I know. I was fully within my rights to throw a strop the same as anybody. I had more of a right than most of them. You'll agree with me, Phil. You'd have to, as a man with the facts. The facts agree with me. But I didn't. No, I didn't succumb to the easy way out, burrowing up and being all bitter and selfish and never thinking of anybody's feelings but my own, meaning well most of the time and just going about it all wrong, and you just have to know how to take him, really, but God he makes it bloody difficult sometimes-

"River?"

Hm? Oh yes. Day-saving.

Please Mummy, shut the Doctor up and calm Jessica down, all at one fell swoop.

See, I know the Tardis better than Mum. The Doctor, too. And he, of course, was off in the wrong direction hunting for a sticking plaster. So I snuck Jessica back to the console room, and I showed her where it was safe to put tinsel. Round the banisters and railings, round the monitor. Round her head. All came up rather festive, in the end. And perfectly safe. And suddenly everybody understood what all other parties had been trying to say. Compromise reached, equilibrium restored, peace and goodwill to all bloody men.

"River, you're smiling."

"Well, it was _nice_, Doctor Frungle. Just because I'm a diagnosed psychopath doesn't mean I can't _enjoy_ the odd nice memory every so often. Honestly, I'm sick of this kind of self-fulfilling treatment from your profession, it's-"

"No, I mean… We're having this conversation because you came back still very annoyed."

"Yes. So?"

"And you're _smiling_."

"Oh. Oh, I see what you're getting at. Oh, Phil. Poor, sweet Phil. You think that's the end of the story. That The Tinsel War began and ended on that one little skirmish. Oh, you're a dear, you really are."

[For poor, sweet Madis, who has been around from the start and so supportive (Lord love her wits) and who once made the silly mistake of telling me that character conflict was her favourite kind of conflict. Merry Xmas, hon.]


	3. Chapter 3

Can't remember how we all got talking about panto. Jessica, probably. She's a wonderful conversation starter; she's never done anything.

Anyway, it kicked off with Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Where are you from, Phil? How are you on fairytales?

"Is that anything like Princess Timespell?"

I don't know that one. It's the one where the little girl's evil stepmother gets jealous of her and tells a huntsman to take her out in the woods and kill her. Only he takes pity and sets her free instead. And she shelters with this ragtag bunch of dwarves and-

"Murder attempts, witch, glass coffin?"

Yeah.

"That's not Timespell, that's… my niece is mad about her… Appleby, Princess Appleby. And the dwarves are Sleepy, Sneezy, Bashful, Grumpy, Dopey, Happy and…"

Oh God. Seriously? Seriously, Phil? I'll give you a clue, what have you, me and the person we're primarily discussion all got in common? Honestly, Frungle, where did you say you got you qualifications?

Anyway, I still can't remember why we were talking about fairytales. Aladdin came up. None of us could remember how it ended.

"What one's he, now?"

Poor boy in the far east, falls in love with a princess, meets a genie? He wishes himself into being a prince, pulls the girl. There's a magic carpet involved and he woos her by whisking her off on adventures in far-off places.

"He has an evil uncle, and something happens, and him and the princess live happy ever after…"

Yeah, but what's the _something_, Phil? That was what none of us could figure out. The bit in the middle. The Doctor was getting very frustrated, you know how he likes to know everything. But none of us could remember at all, the thing that happened. Some great peril they face before the end.

More to come, Phil Frungle, watch this space. And you will let me know if you remember, won't you? I'll be tortured.

Sleeping Beauty came up. You have to laugh, really; Mum still got all wound up about that one and that old story never happened to her anymore. Honestly, it was like something about this old, ancient story tapped right into her and Daddy, woke up this aborted time they shouldn't even remember. Wonderful to watch; they barely even knew they were doing it.

"I'm afraid I don't follow, _Doc_."

Oh, you've caught up, well done.

Well, for instance, I turned to explain to Jessica that the princess slept for a hundred years-

"Oh, _this_ is Princess Timespell."

You're interrupting me again

- and Mum and Dad both, in the self-same moment, said, "More like two thousand."

And I explained that the prince had to face a great many trials in his pursuit of her, like dragons and a forest of thorns, and Daddy filled in, "And Picts and Vikings and Cromwell and bombings and disco."

"Disco?" Mum says to him.

He nodded and told her, "Some rich toff wanted to put a DJ booth on top of you."

…

Oh, grow a sense of humour, Phil. Stop going through the file. I told you, none of this happened anymore. It's been unwritten.

"Maybe you had to be there, then."

You're a sarky old sod, aren't you, Philip Frungle?

"Where's all this going, River? What's this got to do with the mood you came back in?"

Oh! Dick Whittington! About a man who gives up the only creature he truly loves, and tries to walk away, and keeps getting called back to it!

Cinderella, Mr Frungle! About the fragile young spirit that lives or dies and gains or loses it all on a single dance!

I still can't remember why were talking about pantomimes, how that got started. But I remember now why it went on so long. Why it's so stuck in my mind. Why it stings like a blade and so I had to bring it up.

Because the lost wounded girl taken in to a house of weird strangers was too much like Jessica. Because the mad pretender showing up on his magic carpet to take us all to far-flung places, that was too much like the Doctor. Because Sleeping Beauty annoyed Mum and Dad so. Because if I had Dick Whittington's cat here with me I'd wring its neck and tie it up in a sack and drop it down the deepest well I could possibly find.

We were trying to find one that didn't cut too close to the bone, and we never got there. Don't think we didn't exhaust the bloody list, either, we went all the way down. Even The Princess and The Pea is about a prince finding his true love because she's being a massive bitch, and didn't I try to kill him that time?

"But wait, what about the other one you mentioned? The dancer one?"

Oh, Cinders…

Can't tell you yet where Cinderella comes in. Couldn't tell them either. All I could say was that Cinderella was hitting very, very close to a nerve that was not raw yet but soon would be.

Or in short, Phil, spoilers.

"Oh no, it isn't."

Oh yes it… wait, what?

"You're back in the future now, River. It's probably here in the file."

"Very probably. But you never know who's listening in when I'm telling a story. Especially when I'm about to move on to something as beautiful and terrible as Christmas Eve with the family."

"Oh yeah. I'm sure they're holding their breath…"

"Grumpy. We got Grumpy, didn't we? I'm fairly sure we got Grumpy."

[For darling Dyani, who may well like my plotting (and is a sweetheart for saying so!). But there are only a few basic stories, right? They just keep on cropping up! I'd stick a bow on this chapter if I could, love!]


	4. Chapter 4

Then came Christmas Eve. Then the cards arrived. Only the twenty-fourth, but he gets his post early at Christmas. Parked up in Mum and Dad's back garden. That postman must think we're all mad. He wasn't thinking much at that precise second, though. Maybe about back pain and camels and the instinctive physics of load-bearing.

You can imagine, between the two of us and all the times and places, we rack up a card or two.

"Yes, I believe there's a sack waiting in your cell."

I'm not surprised, Phil. Same as every other year. And I shall reply to those, with short, but thoughtful, handwritten thank-yous, as is proper and courteous. I'm never all that sure when Christmas is coming up, see, so I don't really get a chance to send out cards of my own. But I make a point of acknowledging each and every one of those cards. Even the multiples.

"Multiples?"

Yes, well, sometimes we miss a year. Keeping count of three-hundred-and-sixty-five days is all well and good on the walls of a jail cell, Phil, but really Christmas mostly happens because Mum calls the Doctor and demands we visit for dinner. Did buy him a calendar once, but he showed up twenty minutes later with his Santa hat back on. Time passes differently for us. So we get multiples. More years passing for others, and they send a card each year. You see what I mean.

"Sounds confusing."

But that doesn't mean we shouldn't bother with common courtesy, does it, Doctor Frungle? No indeed. What are we then but barbarians? It is tradition which maintains our politeness and our politeness which demonstrates our respect for each other.

And what's really rich is that's a direct quote from _him_.

"Sorry, you skipped the part where you tell me what exactly the problem is?"

He ignores them, Doctor Frungle.

No, I apologize, I've lied to you. Matter of fact, ignoring them is the last thing he does. Just the people behind them he ignores. The cards he's quite happy with. He goes through each envelope, and if it feels like there's something tucked into the card or like it's a pop-up card or one with googly eyes stuck on the front, he opens it. But the rest he throws in a heap. This year he gave them to Jessica. Thought the reading might improve her English a bit.

There are beautiful things in some of those cards, Phil. So much love and gratitude, from all over the past and the future and all the worlds. They pour out their hearts in thanks. Some have been writing so long they're letting him know how the grandkids are getting on. Years and years, without a reply, and still writing to him, in the hope and faith that somewhere out there he's paying attention.

I told him, I _said_ to him, "The least you could do is read them."

"Oh," says he, "Jessica's going to tell me if anything important comes up."

Important for him, he meant. His little learner secretary looking out for any clues and warnings that might have been posted to keep them from psychic or electronic interception. He gave her a _list_, you know.

"Of what?"

Buzz words, Phil! Triggers to look out for! 'General' and 'Silence' and 'Dalek' and so on. The cheek! And him playing with his pop-ups and googly eyes! Oh, and the parcels, of course. He keeps those. Nobody else can _touch_ those. Took him four hours to open them all. And do you know what he did with most of them? I mean, can you even guess?

He put them in a trunk. Things he already had. Variations on things he already had. Handmade things. Someone had knit him a scarf from here to Cloridon Four and he says, "Oh no, I've got one just like it."

"No, you _haven't_, sweetie," I said to him, "Because somebody's gone to the trouble of making it for you."

And do you know what he said to me? Do you know what he had the front, the sheer brass-

"River, please."

The sheer brass, to say to me? He said, "Do _you_ want to wear it?" Perfectly serious. Like he was doing me a favour. Like I'd been angling after the ugly bloody thing the whole time. I took it, of course, but only so it wouldn't go in that damned trunk. It's in my overnight bag.

"And what was it about all this that got to you, River?"

Oh, Doctor Frungle, where to begin!

Anybody else alive would be overwhelmed by that kind of display. You name me one living being who is in a position to take that for granted.

You're about to say the Doctor, aren't you, Phil?

I've been in this room a good half-hour now, Phil, and I've had time. Let me tell you I've spotted no fewer than twenty-eight ways to kill you already, and that's without leaving my seat. That's almost one a minute, Phil. That's some outstanding training for you right there.

"Point taken. Go on."

Where was I?

"Anyone else would be overwhelmed."

Ah yes. It's the _ingratitude_ of it that really aches in me, Phil. I could have killed him. There are only so many things you can use advanced age as an excuse for, and I don't care who you are or what you say, or even about the fact that I haven't got a third of what he's got on the clock, that never gets boring. Crates upon crates of Christmas cards never ceases to warm the heart. A _single_ Christmas card does that. How is it that all these thousands upon thousands of lives he's touched can reach out to him and he can just toss it all in a trunk! Walk away like it's nothing?

"Your own Christmas cards, River; how did you react?"

Well, I… No, do you know what, Doctor Frungle, I'm not going to be ashamed to tell you, I cried. Just a little bit, just to myself. And not just because some of them weren't very complimentary and clearly sent in a spirit of well-deserved spite. I haven't always been an angel, you know, Phil. Hard as you may find that to believe…

"Who among us has?"

Precisely. Just the proper attitude, Phil, well done.

"But can I ask you, River, if it isn't a personal question, how your batch scaled up against his?"

Oh, no comparison. I had one crate and he ended up with about three. Postie had to do two runs, see, Mum and Dad ended up with a half-one too.

"So would it be fair to say you might expect the Doctor to have been three times as overwhelmed as you were?"

…What are you saying?

"Now, River, you're glaring at me a little bit there. If we could just-"

No, it's _fine_, Doctor Frungle, for you to stick up for him, if that's what you're doing, but I would just advise you to weigh very carefully what you say next, and to make very sure that you mean it, and that you can back it up with something.

"Will you concede the _possibility_, at least, that the Doctor might have another way of dealing with the emotions that you yourself experienced?"

The universe is expanding, thus proving the existence of the infinity it is necessarily expanding into. Within the infinite span of infinity there are infinite chances for any random confluence of factors to occur.

"…Beg pardon?"

Everything's a possibility.

…He doesn't even pick anybody out. You'd think, in all of that, out of all those people, there might be a voice he would… _look_ for. A favourite. Somebody he'd _want_ to write back to. "Can't reply to _everybody_," says he, "Wouldn't be feasible." _Feasible_! I mean, what kind of a word is _feasible_.

Says me back, "I didn't say _everybody_, I said… Oh…"

"River?"

I know I've thrown them at you with deadly accuracy twice now, but could I please have those tissues back?

"…Do you mind if we do it one at a time now?"

Don't worry, they're not one of my ways to kill you.

You leaning back over the desk, though, just like this. This is one of the ways. Part of a good few of the ways, actually. Second only to the fountain pen. That's a silly thing to keep in a place like this. You shouldn't even really have a ballpoint on the desk. That's basic. You'll learn, you know. The first time they patch up your neck, and trust me, there will be enough times for you to look back and define the first, you'll learn that one. That's how you'll recognize that day, in fact. The actual stabbing will fade from your mind with the trauma of it. 'The day I stopped keeping pens of any kind on the desk', though, that'll be your in. Little gateway into a dark, repressed little corner of your mind. The face behind the fist that swung towards you with the pen sticking out of it. Won't be my face, though. I don't need to kill you to leave, and you're not going to push me that far, are you, Phil?

"…Do you feel better, River?"

"Little bit, yeah."

"So tell me more about the Tinsel War. Did it continue into Christmas Eve?"

"Oh, absolutely. Christmas Eve brought the Attack of Treezilla…"

[To golden Idoloni, one of my first reviewers and a real darling about it. I was on the bus with a friend when I got your first Scone review, hon, and I can still remember how much it made us smile. Much love and festive cheer.]


	5. Chapter 5

It is a condition known as Treezillaism.

That's not a real condition. He'd tell me off for making up conditions, but he's not here. You'll let me off, won't you, Phil?

Were it real, it would be a condition found primarily in the human female, though reports of male Treezillaism are more and more common with every passing year, and is universally activated by the appearance of a battered box of Christmas decorations in the home dominion. Upon this arrival, the box usually having been hauled down from some damp attic or out from under the stairs, the classic Treezilla will immediately begin to display a number of symptoms.

"Wait. I thought you said he hated tinsel?"

Oh, not the Doctor, Doctor.

No, we'd landed by this stage. Back at Mum and Dad's place.

It's my mother. She is the afflicted in question.

Anyway, to get back to my discussion of Treezillaism, if you don't mind. The Treezilla's instant reaction to the box of decorations is that of childlike glee. Those in recovery, or in the later stages of the condition, report a very clear visual image of what they intend the decorated space to look like. Not just that, but of the cheery, festive, heartwarming times to be had within said space. A sort of encouragement theory, to put it in your terms.

"I'll do the jargon, if it's all the same to you."

Deepest apologies, Phil. Anyway, the behaviours which characterize the negative stereotype of the Treezilla's condition-

"_Jargon_, River."

-Can all arguably be traced back to this image, this perfect peace and happiness and goodwill to all men, as represented by the bedecked area.

"And what would those negative behaviours be, Doctor Song?"

Don't sigh at me, Doctor Frungle, it doesn't suit you. Neither would a neck brace.

But take my mother as the classic case, and this Christmas Eve past as the classic example.

It began beautifully, you understand. It usually does. The subject's delight bore up those around her. Even on arriving in the street, realizing how long they'd been away, the only undecorated house, it began. And the instant he set foot through the door, my poor husband and father were shoved towards the cellar door and told to bring up all the necessary paraphernalia whilst she made teas and hot chocolates and mulled wines. Scene setting, you see. They all do it; cinnamon scented candles, hearth fires burning, _Fairytale of New York_ on the radio.

All wonderful. And we all agreed that there was, after all, one fairytale that offended absolutely nobody, despite doing its level best to get us all.

So far so typical. Where it began to go wrong, where it always begins to go wrong, is when the practicalities kick in.

The Treezilla will want the entire family group to be involved. As I said before, my mother's enthusiasm had been contagious. Everyone was cheery and willing. Equally enthusiastic. That's a major problem for any Treezilla. It is _their_ tree, _their_ decoration. Nobody else's. You can join in, you can help, but under _their_ direction. Heavens forfend, for instance, you might, as my poor father did, hold up a gold plastic star above the chimney breast mirror and say, "What about this here?"

She shook her head and said, "Don't be ridiculous, Rory." That was the first one. The first snide little batting-away. Not done in spite, you understand, but only because that star, as she saw it in her mind, was to be hung from the lintel in the hall in case of visitors. Of course, Daddy didn't understand that. Nobody sees the image but the Treezilla themselves.

He was _trying_. Wanted to show he was taking an interest, being creative. Treezillas are not creative. They will typically reproduce roughly the same arrangement of decorations year-in-year-out. Thus my father was put back again and again, told to hold this and do that but never having his own ideas taken up. Ultimately he sat down to replace the broken bulbs on the fairy lights.

Oh God, that he had just sat down quietly to it.

There are three things you should never do when a Treezilla is at the height of their fervour. The first, and my father's cardinal sin, is complain. Do not, under any circumstances, take exception to anything they might do or desire. Should they cast you down to the lowly cellar of minor electrical work, accept this. Don't mutter and mumble under the volume of the music so she has to periodically spin on her heel and bark, "What? What was that, Rory?"

Lucky he knew when to stop.

"Why, what happens if you don't?"

Oh, Phil, but the worst of the worst. Words nobody ever wants to hear. The baubles in hand are thrown down, and bounce or shatter depending on their make-up and the Treezilla cries out, "Well, _you_ do it, then." Or similar. And _that_, Phil, that is game over as far as a happy family Christmas is concerned. They crash and spiral and they'll never, ever forgive you for it. They could cancel all The Royle Family Christmas Specials forever and it wouldn't be so great a downer on the day as a disappointed Treezilla.

Thankfully, he didn't go that far.

"So what are the other things then? The things you must never do, I mean."

Well, Jessica was the second of them. Bless her heart, she'd never had Christmas before. The whole thing was new and exciting and there were coloured flashing lights. Girl thought she'd died and gone to the Tian Lu Quan. But you must never, never be more enthusiastic than a Treezilla. They are commonly known to send even children, for whom Christmas was made and intended, from the room in annoyance. Or set them to small, meaningless tasks, like untangling lights and feeding them over to Daddy to be checked.

Wasn't her fault, really. The hot chocolate got her all psyched up and we'd been messing about with that tinsel the day before. Thought she was doing the right thing. But, whether due to the trauma of that previous day or just to keep her decorated spaces mentally separate, our own home tree was the one place Mum didn't want tinsel.

"And what did she say to her?"

Oh, nothing. Gritted her teeth, put up with it. She's not a _monster_, Phil. But Jessica's very good at signs and signals, body language, that kind of thing. She's had to be. She saw it all. And because nobody could explain to her what she'd done wrong it rather brought her down a bit. She took the light-untangling job with the sweet fervour of one who would fill a sieve to the brim for forgiveness.

"Don't; I'm welling up."

That's what happens, Frungle. That's what Treezillaism does to a family. If it helps you can picture Jessica wrapped from shoulder to fingernail in fairy lights, because she was trying to keep them out straight, so she wound them round herself. As an image that should probably cheer you up.

"Oh, shut up. What's the last thing?"

Do you want me to shut up or do you want me to answer a question? Think before you speak, Doctor.

Did you know, by the way, that the world goes through up to thirty-six million Christmas trees in a year?

"What?"

Oh yeah. And an artificial tree, now that'll last you an average of six years.

"What's that got to do with anyth-?"  
>Just one acre of average Christmas trees produces the oxygen requirements of eighteen people.<p>

Now you know three pointless facts about Christmas trees. My husband, Doctor Frungle, has got at least another two dozen of those. I'm not going to tell you anymore, in case you ever meet a Treezilla. You must remember never to _breathe_ a single word of any of those three facts to him or her. If I told you any more, you might forget yourself. One might slip out.

Then another.

And another.

One after the other, pointless and irritating fact after pointless and irritating fact. Pity, too; he was doing so well otherwise. Doing as he was told with a bright, chipper smile. I almost thought he might have gone the distance, seen it all through until the star went on. But he can't _bloody_ help himself. Always has to be the smartest thing in the room, and has to _prove_ it, right out loud, for all to hear.

"But I don't understand. Surely that just meant he was paying attention, being interested-"

It's not in the manual. For one, a Treezilla does not care where the tree came from, what it's made of, who put the first one up ever. They care about _their_ tree, which is precious and individual and there's never been nor will be one like it.

"Ah…"

And in addition to that, pointless-fact-exchange is not acceptable treeside conversation. He should have been talking about looking forward to turkey and Steve McQueen and Christmases since-gone-by. Scary ghost stories and tales of the glories, as it were. It's not like he doesn't have plenty to go over, now, is it?

"River, I don't know if you've noticed, but if you grab it any harder you're going to pull the arm clean off that chair."

Hm? Oh. Sorry.

Just makes me angry, is all. He could see it happening, Phil, we all could.

"What happened? What else could be done to the lights?"

Oh no, Phil, much much worse than little strings of fairylights, for him. We're not talking about some minor transgression like complaining or hyperactivity. We're talking about not fitting in with the gameplan at all. This is unforgivable. This is the deepest of sins.

No, Mum sent the Doctor to do the outdoor bits. Without gloves, too.

"Dear Lord… And you, River. Where were you, in all this?"

The Crystal Maze, Phil.

"Sorry?"

No adjacent baubles the same colour or shape. It's a much more difficult puzzle than people realize.

"I'm afraid I still don't get the reference."

Oh, few will, these days. You should hop back to the nineties, though, it's good fun. No, Phil, I was where I usually am. In the middle of it all, trying to balance out all parties. Make sure nobody got any baubles shoved anywhere uncomfortable, and nothing uncomfortable shoved in their baubles, if you'll pardon the phrasing.

"Sounds tense."

It was.

"Sounds like you didn't enjoy it."

How could I?

"Tell me another pointless fact about Christmas trees."

The first Christmas tree lights were actually the strings of light bulbs used in early telephone exchanges, on the switchboards.

Oh.

Oh, very clever, Phil. Yes, I was paying attention. Yes, it's all burned on my memory. No, it wouldn't have annoyed _me_ to have him firing off useless bits and pieces about fir trees at me. Not at all. I'm not sure he and I have ever put up a tree together, you know. Not just the two of us.

Doesn't change the fact I was ready to kill them all, though.

"It must be such a wrench for you to remain peacable."

_Finally_, a psychiatrist who _understands_!

"Did nobody do anything _nice_ this Christmas, River?"

Oh, don't get me started… He can't even do _that_ right…

[For the Brighty shining star on top of my tree, who has only ever been _constructive_, and never complained or been pointless. Lots of love!]


	6. Chapter 6

Alright, I'll tell you what he did. The _nice_ thing that he did, right? Or his idea of a nice thing, anyway. Now bear with me, here, it's not an easy thing to understand.

Mum and Dad don't know most of their neighbours very well. He doesn't always time it right bringing them home, so it looks like they disappear from time to time for weeks at a stretch. It saves on presents, anyway. But there's one of them, directly across the road. Woman on her own with two kids.

After the tree debacle, to get her calmed down again, Dad suggested they go and visit. Drop off a card, couple of selection boxes for the kids. Nothing special, just a token. Just to say hi at Christmas time, the way you do.

"And where were you?"  
>At the house. She made the Doctor do the outside lights, remember?<p>

"Without gloves, too, you said."

That's where I was. Manning the basin of hot water and the fluffy towels, coaxing him back from the verge of frostbite.

"There was snow out?"

No, but he's a man. The first hint of numbness counts as the verge of frostbite. Anyway, it was nice to have him at my mercy. I needed to tell him off for annoying Mum two days in a row. Wasn't sure he really understood what Christmas Day was going to mean to her, how important he was. I was trying to drive that point home. Jessica, before you ask, was totally oblivious. Daddy had introduced her to the idea of making garlands out of popcorn and it was four hours before she so much as moved again. Even that was just to ask for more popcorn.

Anyway, about an hour goes by, peace returns, and then Mum and Dad returned too.

Not so peaceful, see. I'm sorry, Phil, but this is one of those sad Christmas stories. It has to happen, I supposed. It's that time of year. Everything gets bright and beautiful for the many and it makes the few look even darker. She'd lost her job, you see, that woman across the street. The way Mum put it was that Santa Claus wouldn't have much trouble getting the presents down that chimney.

Then we tried to explain Santa Claus to Jessica, scared the living daylights out of her with horror stories about a time-travelling madman who housebreaks and watches children sleep, and no more was said about it. Sad, of course, but what was anybody going to do? It was moving-on time.

Anyway, it gets late on Christmas Eve. Mummy's curled up against Dad, watching the carols on TV, Jessica's sprawled on a beanbag eating through popcorn strings in her sleep, and I'm sitting quietly, peacefully happy under my husband's arm on the sofa.

"Sounds idyllic."

Then he remembers he has this one present left to wrap and bolts off back to the Tardis.

"Oh."

Yeah, 'Oh', my sentiments exactly. But I say to myself, well that's alright. If he goes and wraps something and comes back, then that's fine. That's, what, ten minutes? Tops?

Half an hour later I went to see what was keeping him. Thought it might be best, too, to stay out of his immediate way.

"You were spying."

A little bit, yes. Now, when I found him, he was head and shoulders deep in a trunk much like the one he had previously thrown all his presents into. He came out of that when a Santa hat.

"And how did that make you feel, River?"

Inordinately annoyed. Is there a note in that file about the hats? All the psychs know about the hats, somehow.

"It's sort of a myth, actually."

Oh. Oh, really? Oh, I like that. Yes, but anyway, I was spying, so I couldn't shoot it off or anything like I'd normally do, so I had to let it go. Can't tell you how it irritated me, though. So he puts this bloody hat on, and swings this bag over his shoulder and off he goes.

"What bag?"

Well, that's what I was thinking, Phil, and I'll get to that one. He had this big bulging bag over his shoulder, is all you need to know, and a Santa hat on. Well, you could never have guessed what happened next.

"Yeah, alright, there's no need for that."  
>Just because I'm better at sarcasm than you, Phil, there's no need to get tetchy. Anyway, you see where this is going. He trots off across the street, me following at a discreet distance. Tried the chimney, but… well, I'll never say to you that he's well-built, not in his current self anyway, but he wasn't getting down there. So he goes down to the window, where the kids are tucked up in bed asleep so that their own paltry Santa can show up and just knocks.<p>

"Wait, he _went down_ to the window?"

Yeah, he hung off the gutter. Good thing they woke up, actually, I'm not sure I could have caught him.

I don't know what those kids are going to say on their first day back at school. "You're all wrong about Santa. Santa's an alien. Look at this amusement tech from Origina he brought us. And my little sister got this thing which is nearly a fish, but you never have to feed it and it sings if you poke the water with a stick." Tonnes of stuff, Phil. Apparently this is what he does with his old Christmas presents.

And _what_ their poor old mum's going to do in 2014 when TagToo is the big thing and they've already had it, I just do not know.

Anyway, he brought chocolate and Rubik's cubes and stayed a good hour, messing about with them. Used the sonic to make it sound like there were reindeer on the roof getting impatient as an exit. Those kids had the best Christmas, I tell you.

"Right…"

What? Phil? What are you waiting for?

"Only… you started all this like it really annoyed you."

Well, he was wearing the hat.

"Don't be facetious, River."

Don't be loquacious, Phil.

"Well, you'll forgive me if it sounds like a good and selfless thing to do, if it sounds like proper festive spirit and-"

Because he snuck off to do it!

"Oh, right, because he left you for that, is it? Right, fine, I see…"

Oh, I don't think you do, actually. You think _I'm_ the one being selfish, Phil? You don't even see what I'm getting at, do you? He didn't tell anyone.

"Isn't that how charity's supposed to be? One hand not knowing what the other is doing?"

Alright, Doctor Frungle, _fine_, let's get biblical. What about martyrs, Phil? Why does he always have to be a martyr?

"I really do think you're overreacting, River."

I'm not. Well, no, maybe on _this_ occasion, yes. But where does that end? I have to think about things like this. This is how I live.

"Where _does_ it end, River?"

Can't tell you that.

"Spoilers, is it?"

No. I just don't want to talk about it.

[For Ruth. The Random one, this is. Ruth was about when Scone was a bright comic caper, and stuck around even when the dark bits (like the one above) started to kick in, and has been there when things went dark for me round about Zombi Music. She's a sweetheart, is our Ruth, and I hope Santa brings her everything she asked for. (Because we're in the same country, so if he made it to her, he can make it to me, goddamnit.)]


	7. Chapter 7

"Fine then, River. What _do_ you want to talk about?"

Let's move on to Christmas Day, why don't we? We were getting beyond midnight anyway, and Christmas Day was very nearly nice.

"Oh, Jesus, alleluia."

Don't be cruel, Phil. We're here because I had a rough one, remember? So yes, like I say, Christmas Day was nice. All morning there was cooking, and all the stand-up DVDs that Dad had asked for in the background. We'd done presents. Everyone except the Doctor and I. He'd promised me a nice quiet Boxing Day somewhere, so we were leaving it 'til then. Mum got jewellery from Dad and the Doctor had lengthened out the night to redo those flower beds he kept landing on. Special stuff too, clippings from four star systems, all chosen for the climate of a suburban English garden. Jessica got strawberry laces off my parents and a bracelet off him. Made out of those alligator teeth from… but never mind.

He's good at presents, you know. Most of the time he's really very good at presents. In general.

"In general?"

Calm down, Phillip, we'll get there.

Yes, from the preparation of the veg to the presentation of the pudding, Christmas dinner went very well. The Doctor, it would have seemed, had taken on board what I said about Mum and how much it meant to her. Everyone was civil and complimentary and the whole thing was a laugh.

"Wonderful."

Yeah. Except Mum was dead set on a "Family Christmas".

"Good Lord, River, I just _heard_ you use capital letters for that."

Did you hear the air-quotes? I'm working on enunciating my air-quotes. But yes, Phil, capital-F-capital-C, Family Christmas. Now I'm not sure how familiar you are with twenty-first century British tradition, but that primarily involves chocolate and television.

"Sounds like heaven."

For you, perhaps, Phillip Frungle. Maybe Phillip Frungle longs for a long and easy day on the sofa, with tea and mince pies and a tin of Celebrations, watching bad television and worse films for hours on end while his friends and family laugh at the same jokes and say just as little of any meaning or worth.

"Andacigarette."

Do you need to change your patch, Phil?

"Theoretically, not for another hour. I think I'm _leeching_ the nicotine…"

Have a cigarette, Phil.

"Listen, just because _you're_ miserable, doesn't mean-"

You'll be happier after a cigarette, Phil.

"Are you torturing me because you're in a bad mood?"

I'm torturing you because you're a prison psychiatrist. The palliative effect on my state of mind is just a lovely coincidence

"So what went wrong with Christmas day, then, River?"

Oh, you're a mean person, Phil. It's the withdrawal doing that, you know. Have a cigarette, it'll lighten you up a bit.

"Daleks under the tree, was it? Did a Cyberman come down the chimney? Silurians steal the cranberry sauce, did they?"

_It was the bloody double heartbeat, alright_?

After dinner, all things peaceful and still and _Pride and Prejudice_ on the telly, and I felt it starting. I was lying against him, as is my right and privilege as his wife, and it starts up. I can't describe it to you, Phil, but I'm married to a man with a physical aversion to sitting still for any length of time. He shakes with it. And he fidgets, which isn't great when it comes to leaning against him. And Jessica was sitting on the floor with her head against my knee, so it was all getting passed on to her. Mum taught her how to plait, you see, and she was plaiting strawberry laces. Kept putting big knots in it every time he shifted, or crossed his legs, or leaned over for the television magazine.

Which he's not allowed.

"Why not?"

Can't tell you, don't ask, too important, things he can never, _never_ know in the Earth TV Guide, please, please don't make that go on record anywhere ever, Phil. It's too important. Mum and I were keeping it away from him.

Anyway, he's not a massive Austen fan. Well, no, that's not true. He _used_ to be. He coached dear Jane through most of the major plot points of _Pride and Prejudice_, so he has trouble watching these adaptations. Don't really match his original vision. Never met a Mr Darcy he didn't hate.

He said, "This is _boring_, what's on BBC, why can't we watch BBC?"

And Mum and I said _No_, quite loudly and at the same time.

Daddy, being a bit thick and missing the point entirely, says, "Actually, I wanted to see Wallace and Gromit." And Mum and I said, _No_, in a low, warning way which really should have made him aware of what we were getting at. He said, "Or _The Gruffalo_! We can watch _The Gruffalo_ again, Jessica's our excuse! She's never seen it."

And the Doctor suddenly decides he wants to sit still a while longer, provided _The Gruffalo_'s on, and can we watch _The Gruffalo_ please with the mouse who sounds like Craig and please-please-please.

Mum cut in, "No! And it's _The Gruffalo's Child_ this year anyway."

That saved us. Neither the Doctor nor Daddy was willing to look at a sequel like that.

So we sat for another while. And Elizabeth's just getting to that point on the moor where Darcy's coming towards her out of the mist, and it all kicks off again. The hearts getting faster, the foot tapping, the little drumbeat with the fingertips on the back of the sofa cushions. Elizabeth and Darcy are about to confess and, "1914!" he cries out loud. "Rory! You, me, football, trenches of the First World War. We'll steal uniforms, nobody will know!"

If it had been up to me, Phil, I would have let them go. It would have shut them up. Peace would have descended on the house like a white Christmas. Me and Mum and Mr Darcy. I'm not saying I'm not perfectly happy in my marriage, but that would have been just lovely, with some godawful Baileys variation you never see any other time of year and a half a Milky Way, it really would have. Let them go. They'll play football, come back, talk about Germans, by which point Paul O'Grady will be on and everybody could be happy. I have the foresight to see things like that for what they are, Phil!

"But your mother didn't, I suppose."

Not a bit of it. Family Christmas, Phil, with tinsel and turkey and Capital Bloody Letters_._ Nobody was going anywhere.

"Stalemate, then."  
>More of a ceasefire.<p>

"Ceasefire implies both sides were willing participants."

See this here, Phil?

"What, your elbow?"

No, no, no. That there is my Remindinator. In that whenever I tell him something, which he promptly abandons, this is what I use to make him remember. He stopped asking about the bloody BBC and all, I'll tell you.

"As vicious and commendable as that all sounds, what _is_ this BBC thing?"

Oh, there are things there he can never learn of. There is, quite literally, no secret more important to keep from him _in the universe_. And usually it's just an hour or two we have to avoid, but they put the lanky, rubber-faced-sans-eyebrow menace on the ads this year as well. Never know when he's going to turn up. I just… I don't know what the Doctor would do if he found out.

No, that's a lie.

There would be a massive expenditure of energy, one way or another.

Either it would go outward, and he would tear Terra down to its very core in a blind kind of fury I could never hope to penetrate. Or it would all turn in, and that would be the end of everything.

Literally, Doctor Frungle, it would blow his mind.

Don't get curious. You're curious, I can see it in your eyes, but I can tell you no more than I already have. Don't get curious. It's safer for all of us.

"Ahem… _Ceasefire_? You told me Christmas Day capsized."

Oh, it did.

In the midst of all this tension, this just-barely-keeping-everybody-quiet, Mum had a truly stellar idea.

"_She said sarcastically…_"

She nipped off the kitchen, Phil, and came back with the big guns…

[For Yvraine, who has kind of disappeared, but who was a major source of encouragement back at the beginning. Flicking over old reviews is my Remindinator. Much love, if you're still out there!]


	8. Chapter 8

Matter of fact, Phil, it wasn't even that she brought out the big guns. She brought a cannon, a rocket launcher, a tank. The whole bloody arsenal of big guns appeared between _Pride and Prejudice_ and _Elf_.

"This is some terrible battlefield metaphor for something apparently innocuous again, isn't it, River?"

Selection box this time, Phil.

"Thought so."

But a nice one. Not the cheap, tacky ones you get in the pound shop and give to any kids your friends might have to excuse you buying a gift for the friend. One of the really nice Mars ones with the good silky chocolate. The kind you buy for yourself, and keep in the fridge, and keep good, and you parade it out like a Scots Nigella Lawson.

And everybody understands and says, "_Ooh_…"

I will tell you now, for the sake of clarity, that there were six items in that gold plastic tray. And there were five of us. It was never going to end well.

It came to us with the Galaxy already removed. That was Mum's, and it was her privilege as the provider of the chocolate to have claimed it. Nobody held that against her. And the Magic Stars were given to Jessica because they were the smallest and she was already all keyed up on strawberry laces. The Doctor got the Mars bar and Daddy got the Snickers and I got the Galaxy Caramel, all of which-

"Oh, is _thoroughly_ fascinating, I'm sure."

-_left only the Bounty_, Phil.

Just that one, sitting there on its own, alone and unclaimed. It just looked _lonely_. Just crying out for warm hands to tease back the wrapper and to slightly ease the cold crispness of the chocolate shell before teeth might crack it. Through that outer layer, into the soft, fluffy white insides, that mild, tropical, milky flavour…

I'm allergic to coconut and _I_ wanted it.

Of course I did. Everybody did.

But that was Mum's selection box. Her jurisdiction. Where the last favour should fall was entirely in her hands and there was never going to be any competition. She held it out to Daddy and said, "First refusal."

And he, through a mouthful of Snickers replied, "Yeah, leave it for me."

It sat on the arm of that chair for ten whole minutes. And for ten whole minutes we all, each of us, pretended to watch television and kept an eye on the Bounty instead. Pardon me; each of us _bar_ Jessica. She was using the Magic Stars to draw out constellations on the carpet before she ate them. Orion was lassoing Sagittarius with a strawberry lace.

Bear with me. That's not just unbearably adorable, it's important.

Because at the end of those ten minutes, Daddy had finished the Snickers. And he was feeling a bit sick, what with all the feeding, and so he decided he would keep his blessed Bounty for later. Silly, silly man…

He must have felt the three pairs of eyes follow him from the room, because he ducked immediately back in to find us all staring. Said, "Unless anybody wants a bit." Said that, but didn't mean it, not really. Any of us could have held it up and he would have honoured it, but we couldn't. It's not polite, it's not in the Christmas spirit of good-bloody-will now, is it, to blag pieces off a man's Bounty.

And so off he went to put it in the fridge.

And so, Doctor Frungle, a new battle began.

"Oh, right. The Battle of The Bounty. I see where you've been taking this."

Please, Phil, do not make light of this. This is once again something that hundreds of thousands of homes deal with every year.

This happened at four o'clock on Christmas day and continued until the next morning. You don't understand the effect of heightened awareness over that length of time. It _gets_ to you. The temptation, the paranoia, the _need_. You know you shouldn't, but you want to, and you know everybody else is thinking the same thing, that it's just a case of who gives in first.

It was my husband, as it happens.

I noticed it towards the end of our second time through the Gavin and Stacey Christmas special. He was finishing his drink, you see. Not in any blatantly obvious way, not necking it or anything. Sip by sip, in fact. But constantly. No sooner would his hand come back to the arm of the sofa than it would lift again.

Then, "Oh, dear, hole in this glass, just nip off for a quick top up."

By the time he got to the doorway I had him figured. "I'll help," I said, "I need one too." And he _leapt_ back in at the door and held his hands out and no-no-no, to sit myself down, he'd bring the bottle.

This time he actually got out of the room. Then Mum caught on. I don't know what happened in the kitchen, then, but they returned without the bottle and exchanging a certain kind of haughty glance reserved for a respected opponent in war.

We kept tabs. Mum went to 'empty the dishwasher' and I went to 'turf out a load of Quality Street wrappers'.

"Ooh, air-quotes."

You can hear them?

"Yes, you're getting rather good at those."

Thanks, Phil. Daddy caught on and went to 'check the football results' and the Doctor went to 'check on funny noises from the Tardis'. I needed to 'powder my nose' and Mum wondered what I was doing in the kitchen.

"Stealing a Bounty, I should imagine."

'Heard a tap dripping', actually, Phil. Nobody was actually _stealing_ anything. At any rate, we would have been found out in an instant if we'd even gotten anywhere. But we all just kept _going_ there.

Daddy, of course, despite his initial ambivalence, rather took to the item in question once he realized how much everybody else wanted it. Got defensive. And he was a centurion for a good long while that one time, so he knows how to get defensive and make it count. My God, how he watched us, each and every. Sized us all up as potential threats. Discounted his wife and placed an uneasy trust in me, but the _Doctor_… the Doctor he saw as his Hannibal. Don't get me wrong, the rest of the Family Christmas went on around this, but this was there. This was always the low, bubbling undercurrent.

Even when the night pulled over us, when it was time to turn in, we all managed to end up in the kitchen somehow. How that fridge seemed to glow, like the light had magically stayed on inside, bright with the enchantment of that delectable treat that would have brought me out in hives and it wouldn't have mattered.

Daddy said, "Right. I'll be off to bed then, I think." A murmur of agreement, comment that it had been a wonderful and relaxing day, the usual. Nobody moving, of course, except him. "Amy?"

She lingered and told him "Yeah, I'll be there in two minutes."

He said he'd wait for her, and so she was forced to join him at the door. I won't bore you with the details, but in much the same way the Doctor and I were both coerced into relenting.

Then, from the upstairs landing, suddenly Daddy remembers he forgot to turn the Christmas lights off.

Three other voices, as one, "I'll do it."

And no-no, that was okay. He'd do it. With resignation and not a little resentment we watched him go. It was his and he could do as he pleased with it, but we didn't have to like it.

"Little midnight snack, was it?"

Well, that's what we all thought, Phil. No, no, he still intended to keep it. But he went downstairs, to where Jessica was asleep in the armchair. Nobody had wanted to move her, you see. And he _actually_ woke her and told her that, should she hear anything in the night, that she should investigate. That the Bounty was to remain in the fridge at all costs, that he was to be the only one to take it out.

"What? He set the little girl as a guard?"

She's a very capable little girl. And he has a great fondness for guarding things. He's seen first hand the good that a decent guarding can do. Of course, dear Jessica does rather tend to take things quite seriously.

"I'd never have guessed, after you found her kicking tinsel…"

Well, _precisely_.

I went down for a glass of water about three a.m. I should just point out, I wasn't the first. My husband had already tried and been sent packing. Well, he disappeared out of bed with the excitable tremble of a naughty child and came back grumbling two minutes later. If I'm interpreting correctly, it's because, as he opened the door of the fridge, probably on his tiptoes and easing the door off the seal as gently as he could, Jessica appeared in the doorway behind him.

You sense her more than you hear her. She's lived with enough silence to be very, very good at it. You don't even sense her if she doesn't want you to.

She just appeared, hovering there.

I swear, I had a glass in one hand and the tap in the other. That's all. I was there and the fridge was there, but the fridge is next to the sink, that's all.

"I believe you-"

-Thank you, Phil-

"-Thousands wouldn't."

To hell with you, Phil.

She got Mum too. I heard her getting up, just before dawn.

And yet, despite all of this, the best efforts of Centurion and Assassin, the fact that each and every one of us pretenders had been defeated, come the morning there was nothing. A little gap on the glass shelf between the bowl of stuffing leftovers and a black forest gateau in to defrost, but nothing in it. The glowing outline of a former Bounty.

Not a word was spoken. Daddy suspected Jessica, I know, but the simple fact is, she understands loyalty much better than betrayal, and she's not that fond of chocolate. There was nothing under her fingernails, either, I checked. Mum suspected me, for reasons best known to herself.

"And you, River, I presume suspect the Doctor?"

Yes. And not just because it was a Christmas of generally ill-concieved and inconsiderate gestures overall. Because he's the only person who could have convinced Jessica to forsake her promise, even to cover it up afterward. Also because I put absolutely nothing past him whatever.

"And what was the outcome?"

Oh, _nothing_, Phil. We may never know what became of that Bounty. It's lost now, to time, to the secrets and the pride that fill the gaps in family conversation. Even the person who ate it has probably convinced themselves it was someone else. It will be perpetual, and every Christmas they will talk about it again. Every time the selection box comes out, it will come up.

A story to tell, about that Christmas night all those thieves got interrupted by the little girl, rubbing her eyes on the back of one hand while the other grew out a Tirinnanoc stake hard and sharp enough to go through bone.

"I'm sorry, _what_?"

Well, I told you. She takes things very seriously.

[For Atanaa, who has wanted so often to give Jessica a hug. I found French tales in your favourites, hon, so here goes the last scraps of my GCSE training… _Joyeux Noel, mon ange. J'espère que vous n'êtes pas allergique à la noix de coco_.

Oh my God that's so wrong… I'm so sorry… Have a good one, love!]


	9. Chapter 9

That was first thing Boxing Day. And like I say, everyone ignored it, in that typically British little way.

"Oh, so it didn't ruin the day, then."

Not at all.

"Well, that's good news at least."

No, my husband managed that all by himself.

"Oh."

Should have seen it coming, you know. He was still annoyed he didn't get the giant paperclip out of the cracker. Kept saying how Mum had nothing to clip.

I'd like to think he just forgot, but I can't. Unfortunately I'm not that stupid.

"Forgot what?"

San Tropez.

After breakfast, I went to get ready. Spruce a bit, you know. Won't bore you with all the girly details, but the usual. Did my hair, put my face on, sandals, sunglasses-

"…When are you coming from? Where did we stand with global warming?"

_San Tropez_, Phil. We were going to San Tropez. He'd told me the night before we were going to San Tropez for Boxing Day. Presents on a beach. Turkey leftovers on an open barbeque. _Proper_ presents after dark, but those boys up in the CCTV room can lip-read, so I shan't go into that, if you don't mind.

So off I go, downstairs, stinking of sun cream and having abandoned my paper hat for the first time since Christmas dinner. Mum's at the bottom of the stairs. Didn't think he'd told her, so I decided to break the news. Gently, and with a hug.

But she stood back from me, and she said, "_You_?"

And I said, who else.

And she said, "He's taking _you_ away for the day?"

And I said, "And hopefully the night and maybe tomorrow. What's the matter?"

Mum said, "It's just, he left you your present."

And she's got this poxy little box in her hand not barely wrapped and covered in sticky tape and not even a bow on it. Now, there could have been reasons. Had he just taken off, there could have been reasons. He has things to do, and I understand that. They could be coming up any time of year for anywhere from anybody. They don't necessarily know he's somewhere trying to do Christmas. He has responsibilities. I understand that.

"_But_…?"

He'd taken Daddy with him.

To Germany. 1914. To play football.

Mum had kept them in the day before, but Boxing Day was to be their domain. There was nothing she could have done about that. Didn't think she had to. I can't lie to you, Phil, I was gutted. Not just because he'd been so bloody inconsiderate, either. Boxing Day television is _famous _for getting steadily worse as the years go by. It's never as good as the last time. And that's what was going to happen, you know, another day in front of the telly with my _mother_.

…That came out wrong.

I just mean I'd already _done_ that.

Not that I complained, though. Why would I? What could I do about it? So I went through to the living room, and Mum went to make turkey sandwiches. And I had that grubby-looking little present in my hand, about to open it, picking at the edges of all that _tape_, when there was a knock at the door.

Present or door, either of them could have been good news. Could have been him, coming back or leaving something for me or doing _something_ nice, for God's sake.

I was on my feet, in the living room doorway. Mum was at the front door. Now, there's no plain glass in it, only frosted, but still she was able to turn to me and say, "Oh, God, it's _him_." I told her she had to be kidding. Couldn't be, not after last time. Daddy chased him off with a baseball bat the last time. "No, but it's _him_," she said. "I know by the shadow on the glass."

It's true, he is rather unmistakeable.

I asked her, "What about the restraining order?" Mummy said actors never think those things really properly apply to them.

Said to me, "You answer it. He doesn't know you, tell him we've moved." And promptly hid herself behind the telephone table, just as he was knocking again.

"_Who_ was knocking, River? Who do your parents have a restraining order against?"

…I've said too much, haven't I?

Listen, this is what I was talking about before. The reason he can't watch BBC. The thing he can _never_ learn of. I can tell you, but you must _swear_ never to breathe a word, Phil.

"I swear."

_Swear_ to me, Phil!

"I _swear_, alright?"

Phillip Frungle, on your honour as a man of learning!

"I bloody swear!"

Three times, Phil. Three different promises but all to the same purpose. Think not twice but thrice before you break any of them.

Twentieth century England has done terrible, terrible things to the true legend of my beloved. It's not their fault. Poor, unenlightened souls; it's easier for them to think of him as fiction than as what he truly is. There have been… _people_. Actors. Imitators perpetrating this impossibly heinous crime, for thirty years or more before this particular Christmas.

It's just that one of them in particular happened to run across Mum in a department store once. Kept calling her Karen, and then last year he showed up at the door.

That was the baseball bat incident.

The restraining order came through around Easter.

While I was deciding what to do, he lifted up the letterbox and shouted through, "It _is_ Christmas!" And Mum was waving at me to get rid of him, so I didn't have much of a choice then. I put down the Doctor's manky little present and opened the door.

He looks nothing like him, you know. Whatever else they might have gotten right, they got him wrong. If _that_ had asked me to marry it I might have had more than second thoughts.

"Third and fourth thoughts, hm?"

Well, I might not have stopped thinking, is what I'm getting at.

Anyway, he's stood there, and he has this peeling, oozy sort of a voice and says to me, "_Hello_, not sure we're acquainted, would Mr or Mrs _Pond_ be about?"  
>I cleared my throat and straightened up to do my best. "The Ponds? The Ponds haven't lived here since summer."<p>

He shouted back, "Aha! You didn't correct me, they always correct me, they always remind me that they are the Williamses and not the Ponds, now what's going on?"

Mum pulled herself out from behind the telephone table then and swung around at him. "Look! You've been told before, you're a _mental_ case! None of it's real!"

All he kept saying was, "Is he here? Can I meet him?"

"Who was he talking about?"

Keep up, Phil. The Doctor. They put him on television pretending to be some brutalized child's-fantasy version of my husband. That's what he wants. Thinks if he keeps hanging around my parents he'll meet him eventually.

Mum said to him, "I've told you before, Mr Smith. My husband told you his way and the courts told you another way. That's three kinds of mental case! If you ask me they shouldn't let you work on it anymore if it's going to make you this way!"

But he wasn't listening to her, by this stage. He was looking at me, instead. Staring, in fact. God, you could _hear_ the little cogs grinding away in his head, putting it all together.

Pointed at me and said, "Oh my God, are you home for Christmas?" Mum stopped him, threatened to call the police. "Do they _actually_ break you out for Christmas? You're who I think you are, aren't you? Come here, _darling_, give us a kiss."

Mum declared it all over and told me to close the door. She called the police and we went back to the living room to wait. And he was pressed up against the windows looking in, knocking like we were going to change our minds. "Just don't look at him, River," Mum said, and I swear, he must have read her lips, because I heard him cheer.

The police took their time, but they got there eventually. Took him away, one on each arm, and he's still grinning back over his shoulder like an idiot. Shouted back, "Did he catch the Christmas special, at least?"

"What a weirdo…"

Understatement of the year, Phil… I'm only glad the Doctor _wasn't_ there. God knows what would have happened. There might not even have _been_ a New Year…

"So Boxing Day was stressful then, yes?"

Boxing Day had barely begun with the horrors it had… I hadn't opened that present yet.

"Yes, it has been rather set aside."

Well, I was leaving it. In case they came back. So he could hand it to me himself. Round about Downton Abbey I got bored, though. Tore the paper off it the quick way.

"Well? I think I've lingered long enough in suspense, River."

Oh, don't be kind, Phil, it doesn't suit you.

"Seriously, I'm interested."

Of course you are, but don't pretend you don't already know.

"I _don't_."

Nose stuffed up, Phil?

Don't be coy. You can smell it. I know we haven't met before today, but even you couldn't possibly think this stench has always followed me.

[For Princess Andula. Who is amazing, and shiny, and sparkly, and could be the fairy princess that stands by my fireplace every year (in the mad glitter spangle of my Christmas imagination). Oh, and don't worry, my dear; there will _totally_ be a New Year's. I know that's a special time for you, hon. May your turkey be well-stuffed and your pudding burn blue and brightly.]


	10. Chapter 10

"Oh. Bad perfume."

Bad, Phil? _Bad_ perfume? It's _bloody_ foul! You'd sling it about to keep cats out of the garden! You'd throw it in the eyes of an attacking Krillitane! To clear the moss out from between the garden paving slabs! To ward off unwanted male attention!

"What is it?"

Prada bloody Candy…

"Can I point something out and you won't throw anything at me?"

I think we're a bit beyond all that by now, aren't we, Phil?

"You're wearing it."

…Then again, I do have a minor issue with people who state the obvious.

"Get a divorce then. _OI_! What happened to 'beyond all that', what even _was_ that?"

It was my thirty-second way to kill you. Paper weight. But I missed.

"You got twenty-eight in the first half hour, what happened?"

I'd spotted most of them. The other four only happened when I realized that was a paperweight and not just an ornament. By the way, Phil, should you ever pass any comment on my marriage again, much like the one you just managed there, I will not miss, is that understood?

"_Exactly_! My God, you've just sat here for an hour and more, River, and _moaned_ about Christmas. And yet at _every_ possible juncture it's come out that you either had a brilliant time or were more than willing to put up with it for the sake of other factors. You are _wearing_ the _perfume_, for God's sake! We sat down to find out why you came back here shooting holes in the walls! What's the bloody problem?"

It's a crap gift!

"You're not serious…"

Would you give your wife bad perfume, Phil? Or your girlfriend? If you had one, I mean.

Because he's so good at presents, usually.

Because bad perfume is a gift you give to someone you hardly know.

We didn't do anything of things we _usually_ do at Christmas, and he wasn't as sweet and considerate as _usual_ and there was no sense of tradition or normality because it's _not_ the usual.

"I don't follow."

No, of course you don't.

It's usual for me. I've done it before. Been there, done that, got bored of it and moved through that into an acceptance of a few comfortably routine days a year. Worked through all this to a time of good presents and fun and understanding and Mum learning not to buy more chocolate bars than strictly necessary and Daddy knowing better than to try and tell her how to decorate the house

But they hadn't.

He hadn't.

For him, this was our first Christmas together.

"And… and doesn't that make it all the more special?"

Oh, God, Doctor Frungle, like you can't even know... I'll never forgive myself, taking so long to figure it out. Not until the gift, after he was gone. Too late to do anything about it. And yes, God, it's all burned into my mind, but how long for? What memory will I take it away from it? Why couldn't I just be smarter, quicker? I could have clung to every moment of it if I'd only known it was the first for him.

"I don't understand."

I know. I can go now, though, can't I? You're all caught up, Phillip Frungle. I'm not sure what else we can talk about.

"Are you sure?"

Yes. I think it's best.

"I'll call for a guard to take you back."

The guards fear her when she is placid. More so when she sighs, when her eyes are all but shut, when something sad and real in her turns to exhaustion. She can turn in an eyeblink when she's like this.

But she doesn't. From Frungle's office back to the circle of her cell, Doctor Song neither speaks nor snipes, gives no one any trouble whatever.

Fear does not exactly change to pity, but it shades that way. They've had too much experience with her not to stay wary. Still, each of them, every sentry who takes his place at her side along the way, knows that something here is very wrong. Something has gone out of her today. The fight and struggle that brought her back literally shooting was just the final flare of something dying, the glow when the candle has been extinguished.

Perhaps that, or psychic paper, is how he got them to let him in.

Even got them to help, wrapping tinsel up and down the prison bars.

It is nothing much. A plate of turkey sandwiches and a bottle of champagne just beginning to go slightly flat. Behind, with the wrapper peeled back away from the two little chunks, dessert is a Bounty, still somehow pale with condensation, fridge cold.

He's still wearing that bloody Santa hat, but she doesn't care. He still stinks of trench mud, but the perfume drowns it out.

"The Bounty thing wasn't me," he says, very quickly, defending himself. "It was Jessica, she could smell that perfume from under the tree and she knew you wanted that more, so she…" Trailing off and then, softly, apologetically, "I made a bit of a mess of things, didn't I?"

"No," she tells him. "Not at all."

[For _absolutely bloody everybody_! Obviously I didn't have enough chapters to thank everyone personally, and I'm really sorry if I've offended anyone, it was never my intention. Special mentions, however, have to go to Jackaddict and Thundercracker, who might not speak but are always about, Nitroglycerin, LadyElectraBlack, Kehwie, Polkadottedangels, anguauberwald, dejavu122, abalafae, Alfie Timewolf, YOU WHOLE PACK OF LEGENDARY LEGENDS, MERRY CHRISTMAS THE LOT OF YOU AND ALL MY SPECIAL CHRISTMAS LOVE!]


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